Resurgent
by dauntless99
Summary: A post-Insurgent fic, mainly dealing with the recovery from the war and the decisions surrounding what to do about the outside world. Tris's POV.
1. Chapter 1

_ And then the screaming begins._

People around me are shouting at one another, at the blue screen projected on the wall above the faded outline where Jeanine's portrait used to hang. Obscenities flow from Dauntless mouths. A group of men in Erudite blue jump to their feet and begin to argue, while factionless guards point their guns at them and command them to sit back down.

Then a gunshot rings out above the clamor.

I look away from Tobias, over my shoulder, and see that Evelyn holds a smoking pistol above her head, a faint snow of plaster falling on her head and shoulders from a bullet hole in the ceiling.

Everyone falls silent.

"What is this?" She looks directly at Tobias, somehow knowing he was involved. Evelyn's voice is low and dangerous, like his can be, and I know what this means.

"Tobias," I whisper. "We have to leave."

"What _is_ this?" Evelyn shouts. She scans the room, pointing her gun at the Erudite. "Which one of you helped him to create this lie? This _filth_."

No one speaks. No one moves. Evelyn's face begins to turn red. She turns back to Tobias and I, pointing her gun at me. My heart leaps into my throat as Tobias swiftly pushes me behind him.

"Tell me what this is, or so help me, I will kill her," Evelyn says, her voice like a growl.

"It's exactly what it looks like," Tobias says evenly as he slides a hidden gun from his waistband. "It is the secret Jeanine wanted to hide from everyone. What the Abnegation thought we all had a right to know. And if you _ever_ threaten Beatrice again, I will not think twice about killing you. Goodbye, Mother."

Tobias grips my hand and leads me from the room, out the front doors of Erudite headquarters and into the street. I look behind me and see that Harrison, with Tori on his back, Uriah, and Christina have followed us. Uriah carries Lynn's body in his arms.

"Where did you get a gun?" I ask Tobias. "The factionless –"

"You really have no faith in me, do you?" he asks, a small smile playing across his face. "You think I only brought one gun?"

I don't know what to say. And he thinks _I'm_ the perceptive one.

I walk across the Pit floor toward the chasm. Tobias hasn't let go of my hand since we left Erudite headquarters. We carefully descend the hidden staircase into the chasm, where Uriah, Christina, and Tori wait. Tori leans on the rock wall for stability. I feel a twinge of guilt for hurting her injured leg even more.

At Uriah' feet rests Lynn's body.

"She wanted to be here," he says, choking on the words. "I couldn't leave her in Erudite."

We all nod in agreement, and I feel hot tears flowing down my cheeks. I stop pushing away the flashes of Lynn that keep popping up in my memory, and I see her laughing as Uriah shoots a muffin off Marlene's head, her face red and windblown after zip lining.

_"I loved her too,"_ she had said. I finally understand why Lynn was so unhappy with Uriah and Marlene's relationship.

"Does anyone want to say anything?" Tori asks. "I don't exactly like the idea of celebrating right now, and I certainly won't be giving a speech like Eric's."

Uriah chokes back sobs as he tries to speak. "Lynn…" he says. "I've known you since we were six years old. I always thought of you and Shauna and Hec as my other family. I'll…" he chokes again. "I'll take care of them for you."

He leans down and kisses Lynn's forehead, brushing her hair away from her face.

"I miss you already," he whispers, just loudly enough for me to hear over the roar of the nearby river. Then he stands, wiping tears from his cheeks with the heels of his hands, takes a swig from a flask in his pocket, and looks at me expectantly.

"I…" I look up at Tobias. "I don't know what to say," I whisper.

"Just say how you feel," he says.

I turn back to Uriah. I can't talk to him. His tear-streaked face and repetitive swigs from the flask flood my mind with too many emotions. I look down at Lynn. She looks peaceful. She wears a more gentle expression than I ever saw on her face in life.

"I thought you hated me when we first met," I say. "I'm still pretty sure you did. But in the target practice room, you stood near me and talked to me like I was one of you… Like I was already Dauntless. That…" My voice catches in my throat, which feels about as wide as a stirring straw. "That meant a lot to me."

I want to thank her for being my friend in Candor headquarters when no one else seemed to want me. I want to tell her how beautiful I think she looked with her hair buzzed short. I want to say so much more, but all that comes out of my mouth is a strangled sound, and Tobias clutches me to his chest.

I don't expect anyone else to speak, but Christina steps forward.

"I know Lynn always thought of me as an annoying Candor," she says, "and she was right. I don't know when to shut up most of the time. But she was honest too. And brave. And smart, and loyal, and _funny_, which I would never have guessed." She looks down at Lynn's body. "Thanks for taking care of Tris while I was working things out," she says. "Be brave." I feel a surge of gratitude toward Christina for saying what I couldn't.

"Be brave, Lynn," we all repeat.

"She told me once that she didn't want to be buried," Uriah says. "This is where she wanted to be."

He bends down and puts one arm under Lynn's shoulders and one under her knees. He gently places her into the calmest section of water in the underground river, and Lynn floats gently under the rocks and out of sight.

I can't be here anymore. I need to run. To get away from this. I push away from Tobias, past Christina and Tori, and rush back up the stairs, trying not to slide on the damp rock. I run across the Pit floor and to the dark tunnels I've only been in twice before. I race along at breakneck speed until I reach the platform, then climb it, fall into the net, and sit in the very center of it.

It begins to rain as I turn, hearing someone else climbing the platform stairs. In the early morning light, I see Tobias gently crawl onto the net, with Christina behind him.

They don't say anything. They just make their way over to me and sit on either side of me. Tobias wraps his arms around my body and I lean into him, while Christina places her head in my lap and holds my hand. We don't speak. We just sit there in silence for what could be hours, until the tears stop streaming down my cheeks.


	2. Chapter 2

I wake, and for a moment I can't remember where I am. I see only the words "Fear God Alone" painted on a white wall, and all the memories come flooding back to me. I am in Tobias's apartment. As I roll onto my side, I feel his arm around my waist, hear him snoring gently. I press my back into his chest and hope the warmth from his body will fill the icy hole that seems to be eating away at my insides. Lynn's face pops into my mind again, and even though I promised myself I wouldn't, I push it away. I'm tired of crying.

Tobias stirs and grips me a bit tighter as he awakens.

"Hey," he says sleepily. His breath tickles my ear and sends a shiver down my spine, despite my current mood.

"Hey," I say back.

He sits up, and must be able to read my feelings on my face, because he doesn't ask me how I am. He simply says, "Let's go to dinner."

"Dinner?"

"It's almost five o'clock," he says.

As we walk across the Pit floor, I notice that Dauntless headquarters is considerably more crowded than it was the night before.

"More people came back," I say.

"They probably didn't want to be called cowards," he says. I can't blame them. It's about the worst thing a Dauntless person can be.

Just before we enter the dining hall, Christina appears and hugs me. I don't even stiffen at her touch anymore. She takes my hand and leads us to our normal table. Zeke and Uriah sit there already, their plates of food untouched.

"Where were you last night?" Christina says, looking at me gently. "I was worried when you didn't come back to the dormitory."

"I didn't…" I begin. I was going to say that I didn't want to be alone, but I know she and Uriah were both there and that I _wouldn't_ have been alone.

"I needed to talk to her, and she fell asleep in my apartment," Tobias says, rescuing me. I glance up at him, thanking him silently with my eyes. Honestly, Tobias and I fell asleep the moment we returned from the net a few hours after dawn, but the others don't need to know that. Christina seems to have other ideas about my being in Tobias's apartment, but she doesn't say anything.

I notice that Zeke and Uriah both nurse dark bottles, from which they take frequent sips.

"I'm out again," Uriah says as he stands unsteadily. "I'll be right back."

"Uri, don't," Christina says. "You've had four already. Please don't."

"Oh, let him go," Zeke says, slurring his words. "If he passes out, he'll feel better."

"Just one more," Uriah promises, then stumbles off toward the beverages window near the kitchen.

"He can't stop drinking," Christina says to us.

"Can you blame him?" Zeke says. "He lost his girlfriend, his best friend, and who knows how many others in the past few weeks. His life has gone to shit. I know how he feels." He glances a few tables away, where Shauna, Lynn, and Hector usually eat. The table is empty.

"How's Shauna?" I ask.

"She still can't feel her legs. The doctors don't think the feeling will come back, but she's trying. Or, she was, until Lynn…" Zeke trails off, taking another swallow. "She won't leave her parents' apartment."

I don't know what else to say, so I just stay silent.

Uriah returns with two brown bottles, and sets one in front of Tobias.

"Thanks," Tobias says, twisting off the top and taking a long gulp.

"I would have brought something for you two," Uriah says, gesturing to Christina and me, "but I know it would have gone to waste."

"Honestly, I think I could actually use one right now," Christina says. "Tris?"

"I'll share yours, if you don't mind," I say. I could use to feel the warmth the bitter alcohol offers. Maybe _that_ will fill the hole in my stomach.

After sharing several bottles with Christina, my head begins to swim. Tobias decides to take us to an unused apartment to sleep off the inebriation.

"This floor was meant for you all after initiation was finished," he says as we climb into the elevator in the Pire, and he punches the button for the 8th floor. The motion of the elevator combined with the amount of alcohol I have consumed without eating make me feel suddenly awful.

I follow Tobias down a hallway and into an apartment with the number 806 on the door, with Christina on my tail. I don't even stop before heading straight to the bathroom where I become so violently sick that I wonder if it's possible to actually turn myself inside out.

Christina seems to be feeling better than I am, because I don't have any company in the bathroom. When I can finally breathe again, minutes or hours later, I lean over and turn on the shower, but when I try to stand, my legs buckle beneath me. A bullet wound, countless bruises, and severe emotional trauma couldn't keep me off my feet, but a few bottles of that dark amber liquid can.

"Tobias," I call, hoping he hasn't left. "Tobias!"

He bursts into the room like he expects to see me dying on the floor. Instead, he smiles when he sees me.

"Stop it," I say. "I feel horrible. Don't laugh at me."

"I'm not," he says. "But I've been there. Drinking when you're sad can do that. And you haven't eaten anything."

"How's Christina," I ask. "Is she sick too?"

"She lost what little bit of food she ate into the garbage can around an hour ago," Tobias says, smirking. "She's asleep on the couch now."

For some reason, I feel strangely better knowing that I'm not the only one who got sick.

"Can you help me?" I ask, gesturing toward the shower.

Tobias looks confused. "What do you mean?" he asks.

"I can't stand up, but I want to take a shower."

This time he laughs out loud. "I don't think that's exactly a good idea. How about this?" He reaches into a drawer in the vanity and pulls out a washcloth. He runs it under the shower, wetting it, and then kneels in front of me. He gently wipes the sweat and sick from my face with the warm towel, then turns off the shower.

"How's that for now?" he asks. "You can take a shower once you've had some sleep."

"Okay," I say, beginning to feel dizzy again. "My head hurts."

Tobias is clearly having a hard time not laughing every time my mouth opens, but he keeps himself together as he goes to the kitchen and returns with a bottle of aspirin and a large glass of water. I take two of the pills and sip from the glass, since he threatens to take it away if I drink too quickly.

"Come on," he says. "Let's get you into bed."

"But I'm not tired," I complain as he lifts me as easily as if I were a child. "And I don't even know who lives here."

"You do," he says as he carries me into the hallway. "You and Christina were meant to be roommates, so this place is hers too."

We walk into a bedroom with white walls, white curtains over windows that overlook the swamp, and a white bedspread. _I can't believe any place in Dauntless headquarters has this much white_, I think. Tobias gently places me on the cool comforter, and I am asleep before my head hits the pillow.


	3. Chapter 3

I wake to sun shining painfully on my face. Through my closed eyelids, the red glow seems to burn the inside of my skull. I roll over so my back is to the window, and realize that my head is pounding. With every beat of my heart, I feel a vise tightening around my skull, threatening to split it.

I open my eyes a bit to see that a glass of water and the bottle of aspirin sit on the bedside table. I push aside the pain in my head and sit up, take two more of the pills, and take several large gulps of water.

_I wish I still had some of that pain medicine left_, I think to myself, remembering how it quelled the pain from my bullet wound at Amity headquarters.

I hear a knock at the door. Struggling to find my voice, I manage to say, "Come in." It comes out as a raspy whisper.

Christina opens the door and I instantly know that she feels about as bad as I do. Her eyelids droop over her dark eyes, her short hair sticks up at awkward angles, and she walks slowly, with one hand pressed to the side of her head.

"Oh, thank God," she says, snatching the bottle of aspirin off my bedside table. She takes a few of the pills, then downs the rest of my water. Collapsing on the bed facedown, she groans loudly.

"I'm never touching that stuff again," she says, her voice muffled by my comforter.

"Everyone says that," Tobias says, appearing at the door, that small smirk still on his face. "You'll be fine. Just keep drinking water. Do you want anything to eat?"

I shake my head gently, and Christina makes a noise that sounds like a large dying herbivore, which makes Tobias laugh out loud.

"Well, I got you some basics; bread, eggs, milk, stuff like that. It's all in the kitchen," he says. "I've got a meeting with Tori and Harrison, but I'll be back in a few hours."

Tobias kisses me gently on the lips, grins at the back of Christina's head, then leaves the room.

Christina crawls up the bed, lays next to me, and begins to snore. I think I fall asleep too, but I'm not sure. As the sun begins to set, I sit up, take two more aspirin, and feel well enough to get in the shower.

I walk down the hallway and into the bathroom. I turn on the water in the shower stall and stare at my face in the mirror. I hardly recognize myself. My short hair is teased into rats' nests and my eyes are red and puffy. As I peel my t-shirt and jeans off, I see that my body is covered in bruises, most likely from my fight with Tori. I peel the bandage away from my bullet wound, and am relieved to see that at least that is beginning to heal. The bite wound Tori left on my hand, however, looks both bruised and shredded, and I decide to get some antibacterial ointment for it after I shower.

I step into the warm water, letting it wash the dirt and sweat from my body. Once my muscles begin to relax, though, I can't seem to keep the images of the horrors I have seen from my mind any longer. They rush through my head like a video on fast forward. My mother's body crumpled on the pavement. The crease between Will's eyebrows. My father clutching his stomach. Tobias's hand around my throat… The video goes on and on, and I surprise myself when a loud sob escapes my mouth. It seems to have broken a dam and I can't hold myself together anymore. I sit on the floor of the shower stall, hugging my knees, and let myself sob until I can't breathe. Then I just sit there, feeling the warm water hitting my shoulders, trickling down my back. I pour shampoo into my hands and scrub my scalp, then watch as the soap swirls around my feet and down the drain.

When I finally step out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around my body, Christina is sitting on the sofa in the living room. She stands, walks toward me, and places her hand on my uninjured shoulder. I know she heard me crying, but she says nothing. She just squeezes gently, then walks into the bathroom. I hear the shower turn back on as I walk into the bedroom. Then I realize I have nothing to wear. All of my clothes are still in the dormitory, eight floors down and at the end of a long hallway off the Pit.

Exasperated, I sit down on the bed. Just then, I hear the door open, and Tobias walks down the hallway. He stops when he sees me, and I pull the comforter up over my body, even though I'm already covered by the towel. My cheeks burn.

"You… want me to go get your clothes?" he asks.

I nod. "Yes, please."

He leaves again, quickly returning with a stack of my clothes and a stack of Christina's clothes from the dormitory. I snatch a pair of black denim jeans, a black camisole, and my undergarments from my pile, then Tobias leaves the room to let me change.

I pull the tight jeans on carefully over my bruised thighs, and remember them being looser when I purchased them. My muscles have gotten quite a bit bigger since then. When I finish dressing, I knock on the bathroom door to let Christina know about the clothes Tobias brought for her, then meet Tobias in the living room.

He looks at me with a small smile, and I suddenly wish I had grabbed a t-shirt or sweater instead of the camisole, but I push the feeling away and sit next to him on the sofa.

"How did the meeting go?" I ask.

"Evelyn has apparently been going on some sort of rampage. The factionless are out of control, and a lot of them have already left the city," he says.

"A rampage? What do you mean?"

"She tried to shoot Harrison when he went back to collect more Dauntless from Erudite headquarters. He says she's lost her mind. She thinks you and I made that video up. 'Why else would the woman be named Prior?' she says." Tobias looks exasperated. Tired.

"She must be related to me," I say. "It's not exactly a common name."

Then I remember something my mother said to me during the simulation attack. _"I was only safe because my mother was a Dauntless leader."_

"My grandmother…" I say. "My mother's mother was a Dauntless leader. Maybe that's who Amanda Prior is." As soon as the words leave my mouth, though, I doubt that theory. My mother would have taken my father's name at their wedding, so this woman must actually be related to my father. My father, who grew up in Erudite.

"No," I say. "She was _Erudite_."

"Your grandmother?" Tobias asks, clearly confused.

"Yes, but my _father's_ mother," I say. "He grew up in Erudite."

"Everything seems to come back to Erudite, doesn't it?" he says sighing.

"It makes sense, in a way. Caleb and I both have aptitude for Erudite. What are the chances of both of us having aptitude for the same faction if it's not in our blood?" I ask.

"Your faction isn't about blood," Tobias says. "It's about what you believe. What you _feel_." He touches the tip of his index finger to the ravens on my collarbone. "What your heart tells you."

His finger leaves fire in its wake, but my mind is too full of jumbled thoughts to fully enjoy it. I look up into his eyes, and instantly understand what he means. My heart tells me I couldn't be anything but Dauntless. Couldn't be anywhere but here. With him.

"I know," I say. "What else happened at the meeting? What is Dauntless's plan?"

"We decided that tonight, after dinner, we're going to tell everyone everything," he says. "We're going to give all of the Dauntless the choice to stay here or to go outside the fence. Being Dauntless is about being free, right?" he says, smiling at me. He knows that's the reason I chose Dauntless over Abnegation, and his reason is more or less the same.

"Right," I say.


	4. Chapter 4

That night, I slip a long black jacket over my bare shoulders and leave the apartment with Christina and head to the cafeteria. Christina wears a pair of jeans and a tight-fitting black v-neck which shows more skin than I would ever have the courage to. She also wears her crimson lipstick, and black eyeliner, which she forced on me as well. I have to admit, we both look pretty good.

In the cafeteria, I see Tobias sitting with Tori and Harrison at one of the tables across the room from our normal seat. He smiles at me, and gives me a small nod, indicating that I should sit with Christina, Zeke, and Uriah. After a few moments, the room is full and everyone is seated. Tobias climbs onto the table he was sitting near and shouts, "Everyone, we have come to a decision!" I can barely hear his deep voice over the din, but slowly the crowd quiets down. About 30 seconds later, he repeats himself.

"The other leaders of Dauntless and I have made a decision," he says. "We have chosen to let each member of Dauntless decide for himself –"

"Or herself," Tori interrupts.

"Or herself," Tobias corrects, "whether or not he or she wants to leave the city. We have been told that Candor has made a similar decision, but those Candor who chose to leave will be forbidden to return. We will not make such a rash decision. Any Dauntless who decides to leave will forever be welcome back here at headquarters, although any new people met outside of the fence will not be welcomed. This is for the security of what we have here. I realize that lately there has not been very much security surrounding Dauntless headquarters, but Tori, Harrison, and I are working to resolve that. As for me…" Tobias's voice trails off.

My heart skips a beat. Has he already made a decision? If he decides to stay, we might never know what lies beyond the fence. By palms begin to sweat.

"As for me," Tobias continues, "I have not yet made a decision on whether to stay or go. That decision is not one I could make alone." From across the room, his eyes lock onto mine. "Tomorrow morning at ten o'clock, everyone will gather in the Pit, and those who have chosen to leave the city will all venture out together. This will not be your last chance to leave, but it may be your last chance to do so in relative safety. The Dauntless traitors still roam the city, and the factionless are both armed and completely out of Evelyn's control. I will see you all tomorrow." He climbs down from the table in silence as everyone begins to look around at one another. He walks swiftly over to me and sits down, locking his hand with mine.

Once the initial shock wears off, the Dauntless begin to shout at one another. Tobias and the other leaders have left them every freedom they could want, but still they shout about deciding by the morning, about the new leaders' capabilities, about anything they can.

"It seems like they just want something to complain about," Christina says.

"I think you guys made a great decision," Zeke says, clapping Tobias on the shoulder. "Dauntless freedom at its best."

"Harrison didn't think so," Tobias says. "Tori and I overruled him, but he thought the Candor had the right idea. He thought it would be dangerous to allow people to return."

Zeke shrugs. "And the Dauntless can't handle danger?"

"That's what we said," Tobias laughs. "Listen everyone, I've got something to discuss with Tris. I'll see you all in the morning, okay?"

Christina winks at me, a huge crimson grin spreading across her face and I roll my eyes and shake my head at her.

In the hallway, I stop and turn to Tobias.

"How can you even think about leaving? You're a leader now," I say.

"Only because you didn't want to be," he says. "You know they all would have voted for you."

"That's not the point. My point is," I say, "if we go, what will happen to Dauntless?"

"Harrison is staying behind. He already decided that much. And Tori is too weak to do any real traveling anyway. Dauntless would be fine," he says, brushing hair from my cheek with his fingertips. His voice suddenly low and soft, he asks, "Do you want to go?"

"More than anything," I say. "I _need_ to go."

"I thought that Erudite need to know would make you say that," he laughs, and we walk toward his apartment.

He places a black duffel bag on his bed, and I help him to place everything he might need inside. I remind him to bring things like underwear and toothpaste, and he rolls his eyes at me. Tobias doesn't have very much to fill the bag with, which makes me think that somewhere inside him, the Abnegation way of life has stuck around. When we finish, we head up to my apartment. Christina meets us at the door.

"So you two are going, huh?" she asks. "I figured you would." She holds out an empty black bag almost identical to Tobias's. "Didn't think you were getting away from me that easily, did you? I grabbed you one too, Tris," she says, tossing me another bag.

We collect the items that Tobias had brought up for us, then take the elevator back down to the Pit to gather what things we had left in the dormitory.

"Why didn't we do this when we were downstairs before?" I ask. Tobias just shakes his head.

In the dormitory, Tobias sits on my old bed while Christina packs all of the clothes she can possibly fit into her bag, then uses extra space in mine for a third pair of shoes and her makeup box. I don't have that much, although she makes sure I pack the dress she made me buy during initiation. I have no idea why I would need a dress, but since Christina packed two, I don't ask.

"Christina," Tobias says, a solemn look on his face, "Candor isn't allowing any Dauntless to enter their headquarters right now. If you come with us, you might not be able to see your family again."

Christina pauses in the middle of stuffing another shoe into my bag. "I know," she says quietly. "I've thought it over. I love them, and I hope they think like me and choose to leave too, but I need to see what's out there. I can't live the rest of my life not knowing."

Tobias and I nod, understanding, and Christina gives up on trying to fit in a fourth pair of shoes.

"Chris, I only packed an extra pair of sneakers. What are you going to need stilettos for, anyway?" I say as I pull the black suede shoes back out of my bag. The heels are about as long as my hand, and sharp. I can only think of one good use for them.

She shrugs. "You never know."

I sigh, and zip my bag closed. Lifting it onto my good shoulder, I'm pretty sure it weighs about as much as a small elephant, but I don't complain. It feels good to put my muscles to some use. All of the activity has helped to keep me from thinking about this morning.

"Let's go back up to our apartment," I say, looking at Christina and Tobias. "We can leave with the group in the morning. Let's get some sleep."


	5. Chapter 5

I wake to the sun shining meekly through the bedroom window. Tobias lies on one side of me, still breathing deeply, and Christina lies on the other. I smile. Christina was planning to go to her room and sleep there at least once before we left, but apparently she passed out sometime after I did. I give her a small shove, and her eyes blink open. She rolls to the edge of the bed and sits up, allowing me enough room to maneuver around her.

I brush my teeth and stare at myself in the mirror, wondering what I might see. Are there other people beyond the fence? Other cities, even? Maybe there's only marsh as far as you can see. I have to find out.

Tobias, Christina, and I ride the elevator down to the Pit in silence, although a nervous energy seems to fill the car. Tobias grips my hand, and I feel a silent surge of energy travel from him to me, even though we aren't looking at each other. _Just like during the simulation attack_, I think. I feel my stomach churn as the memories of that night begin to push their way back into my mind, and I shove them away.

It seems like every member of Dauntless who isn't a traitor is in the Pit. There are black-clothed people everywhere, and I am surprised to see that a large number of them hold bags, suitcases, and backpacks. Zeke and Uriah stand with Shauna, Hector, and their families. Zeke waves to us, and we walk toward them. Shauna and Hec's mother walks off the second she sees Tobias and me. I'm surprised she could manage to be in the same space as Uriah, given her distaste for the Divergent. Shauna looks up at me from her wheelchair, her face pale and her eyes red, and gives me a small smile. I'm shocked that she even acknowledges my existence, let alone smiles at me. She was terrified of my Divergence a few weeks ago. Or maybe it was only days… I'm not exactly sure.

"Thanks," she says. "For being with Lynn… You know…" She looks away, and I know that she doesn't want me to see the tears well up in her eyes. I don't know what to say, so I say nothing.

"So you're actually leaving, huh?" Zeke asks Tobias.

"Yeah, we are," he replies.

Zeke holds up a large backpack, stuffed full, and smiles. "Couldn't let you have all the fun out there."

I smile at Uriah, who has another backpack slung over his shoulder, and he tries to smile back, but I can tell he's having a hard time with the decision. Dauntless is all he's ever known. I look down at my watch.

"It's almost ten. How is this going to work?" I ask Tobias.

He doesn't answer me. He just cups his hands around his mouth and shouts, "Hey! Everyone who is planning on leaving with my group today, gather by the chasm!"

The rest of the room goes quiet faster than I've ever thought possible for the Dauntless. Everyone looks a bit shocked. Then people slowly start making their way over to the chasm railing. More and more people file past us, and I watch shocked as more than half of the people in the room congregate around the deep hole. I don't know why I'm so surprised; doing the brave-yet-dangerous thing is basically Dauntless law. I guess I'm just surprised that so many people are willing to leave everything they know behind.

Tobias gives my hand a small squeeze and says, "Ready?"

I look at Christina and Uriah, and nod. We begin to walk toward the chasm, and I look over my shoulder to see Zeke kneeling in front of Shauna's wheelchair. She clings to him, tears running down her face. I can't imagine what it must be like for her to lose her sister, her boyfriend, and all her friends in the same week. At least she'll still have Hector.

At the railing, Zeke catches up to us. "I promised her I would be back," he tells us. "I don't know when, but I can't leave her forever. She promised me she'd keep trying to walk while I was gone."

I sigh, remembering the morning Shauna received a bullet in the back. I still feel as though it was my fault. If I had just decided to go back to Dauntless headquarters instead of chasing after Jeanine, she would never have gotten shot. I push that thought away too. What's done is done.

Tobias shouts to the group again, and we all begin to move up the paths toward the stairs. Toward the outside world. Fifty or so strong, our footsteps merge into one low rumble as we ascend toward the Pire, and my memory drags me back to the Choosing Ceremony, and the sound of so many Abnegation feet beating out exactly the same rhythm on the stairs in the Hub. As the memory begins to fade, I emerge onto the glass floor of the Pire, greeted by the now brilliant sunlight. I look up and see a small group of Dauntless children playing on the ropes above our heads. They wave to us as we leave the building, whooping and jumping from rope to rope. I am reminded of a video I once saw in school about chimpanzees, and suddenly wish they hadn't gone extinct.

Wave after wave of Dauntless leap onto the train as it sails by, Tobias, Christina, Uriah, Zeke, and I landing in the last car. Tobias sits in a corner on the floor, and I curl against him, just as I did when I left the city with him for the first time, on the way to Amity headquarters. Only this time, his father and my traitor brother aren't watching us as he wraps his arms around me and kisses the top of my head.

I watch as the city smears past us. Christina stands near the door and leans out into the wind, her clothes pressed tight around her body and snapping behind her. I notice Uriah glancing in her direction, but manage to keep the smirk off my face. I know that if he says anything to compliment her, she won't be able to appreciate it. It is still too soon for her after Will's death to think about another relationship. I push another thought from my mind.

In whatever we find beyond the fence, I will recreate myself. I will no longer be the Tris that fears memories or pushes uncomfortable thoughts from her head. I hope.

The train stops just inside the fence, at a gate I've never been to before. We are on the southeast edge of the city, and I can see the curve of the marsh, a barrier I never knew exited. On one side the marsh stretches on for as far as I can see, but on the other, a sea of prairie grass blows in the gentle breeze.

We step down from the car, most of the Dauntless clearly not used to getting off a stationary train, and walk toward the gate. This one also stands open, like the one leading to the Amity compound, and no Dauntless traitor guards monitor it. Tobias squeezes my hand again as we lead the group of our faction-mates through the fence.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Hey guys! Thank you SO MUCH for all your awesome reviews so far. I'm so pumped that you guys are enjoying this story so far. I know my chapters have been really short, but I'm hoping I make up for that with how often I post new material. Keep sending me your feedback! I do a little happy dance whenever my phone tells me I have a new review. And for those of you who are concerned, I'm going to keep this story rated T, so although there might be some ****_relations_**** between characters, they will not be explicit for the benefit of my younger readers. Thanks again for all your support! 4**

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We walk for several hours through the waist-high prairie grass, occasionally stumbling over hidden bits of stone or chunks of old concrete. It becomes obvious that this stretch of land wasn't always barren, and beneath the grass and weeds, I occasionally see bits of old pavement. Crumbling foundations poke above the plants at odd angles. We walk due south, more or less following what looks like some sort of ancient road, until we get to a huge bridge.

The bridge doesn't span any body of water or any marshland, though, so I can't figure out why it's there.

"Maybe there used to be a river here or something," Christina says, answering my thoughts.

"I doubt it," Tobias says. "There's still hunks of pavement all around. Let's climb it. Maybe we can see something from the top."

I know Tobias never would have made that suggestion if the bridge were any higher, but I stride off away from the group, over to a large hill on one side of the bridge. My small group of friends follow, and we begin to climb. Reaching the top of the hill, I stop dead. I expect to see the bridge in about the same condition as the rest of the ruins we had seen so far, but I had never expected this. The pavement on the bridge shines bright and black, like it was just laid down yesterday, and lines similar to the faded ones on the street where I grew up are painted bright white and yellow across the wide road. A sign on the edge of the bridge reads, "Chicago – No Exit". Another, smaller sign contains only the number 80 on a strange blue symbol. The road seems to go on forever to both the east and the west.

"Wow," escaping Christina's lips is the only sound to be heard. The rest of the group clamors up the hill, and pushes their way out onto the road.

"Which way should we go, Tobias?" a middle-aged man with green spiky hair asks. "East or west?"

Tobias shrugs. "I don't know. Wanna vote on it?"

Everyone nods like they can't think of any better way to make the decision, so Tobias continues. "Alright, who wants to go west?" I few people shout, raise their hands, or make other signs of assent. Maybe about five people.

"East?" Tobias asks.

Everyone else seems to have the same opinion, as the others all shout for an eastward direction of travel. I have to agree, although I don't really know why.

"Alright, east it is," Tobias says, and the small group of people who chose west acquiesce and follow the group as we all begin to walk.

The sun begins to set behind us when my stomach growls. Tobias decides we should make camp on the road, and we do, pulling blankets and food out of our bags. I realize I don't have anything by clothes in my bag, except Christina's shoes and makeup. I roll my eyes at the fact that I reminded Tobias to bring underwear but never even thought about bringing food.

Zeke walks up behind me and elbows me in the ribs. I wince. "Here," he says, handing me a box of granola bars.

"Ow," I say. "Thanks."

I realize that the backpack he is holding is full of food, and that he also holds another bag I hadn't noticed earlier. This one must contain his clothes.

The five of us sit down together on the blue quilt Tobias brought from his apartment. I realize that Christina also packed a large blanket, the white comforter from her room in our apartment, which is why so much of my bag ended up being devoted to her things. We share granola bars, which I'd never tried before, and watch the sun set. The nutty yet honey-sweet taste fills my mouth, and I can't believe something this delicious could actually be good for you, but the wrapper tells me it is, and by the way Uriah bolts them down, I can tell I'm not the only one who likes them.

I look at Uriah as I chew, wondering about him. How he's doing, how he's coping with the loss of Lynn and Marlene. Then he reaches into his backpack, pulls out a flask, and I stop wondering. He's not doing that well.

After we eat, and the stars begin to come out, I begin to shiver. Winter is coming, and it's beginning to get colder at night. Luckily, the beds in the apartment were so large, that Christina's comforter easily covers all five of us as we huddle together on top of Tobias's quilt. Tobias's body completely envelops mine from behind, and Christina's back is pressed against my stomach. Tobias puts his arm under my head for me to use as a pillow. He uses his duffel bag, as do most of the others, and soon I drift off to sleep, despite the cold breeze blowing over my face.

Sometime before dawn, I awaken to a strange sound. Far away, I hear what sounds like a rushing, roaring noise. Blinking the sleep from my eyes and trying to clear my head, I look up and see headlights headed toward us from the west.

"Everyone up!" I shout. "Someone's coming."

The ever-ready Dauntless are on their feet in seconds, blankets gathered in their arms and half-open bags slung over their shoulders. We run to the side of the road, climb over the guard rail, and into the tall marshy grasses, crouching down so whoever is driving won't see us. We have no idea what kind of people live out here, and even for the Dauntless, it isn't worth the risk.

Tobias and I remain close to the rail, lying on our stomachs and watching the vehicle approach. It is large, much larger than any pickup truck I've seen the Amity driving. Tobias clutches at my hand as it nears and the roar of its giant engine increases. The vehicle speeds by us, lit with small yellow and red lights around the huge front end, and around the long rectangular rear end. My heart pounds as the wind the automobile creates makes my hair whip around my face.

I begin to relax after it passes, and I hear sighs of relief from all around me. I watch the monstrous vehicle receding into the distance, and then the rear of it lights up bright red. The red light, which seems to be emanating from a few relatively small lights near the bottom of the square rear end, must signify the vehicle slowing down, because it stops receding. In fact, white lights also appear, and it begins to move back toward us. My heart begins to pound again. I know the Dauntless will never run, no matter how dangerous these people might be.

The huge vehicle comes to a stop a few feet from where Tobias and I lay, and we scramble backward toward the rest of the group. A door near the front of it opens, and a man climbs out. He is old, ancient by Dauntless standards, with a wrinkled face, a white beard, and tufts of white hair poking out of a red cap. I have never seen anyone dressed like him before. He wears black sneakers, blue jeans, a red flannel shirt, and a black jacket which has a dull shine. Out of his pocket, he pulls a large black flashlight, which he shines over us. Tobias and most of the others stand as soon as he does so. God forbid they look as though they were hiding.

"What are you all doing out here?" he says suspiciously in a strange accent. "This area's supposed to be completely abandoned."

"We're from the city," Tobias says. "We decided to leave."

"All together?" the man asks. "On foot?"

"Yes."

"What city is that you're talking about?"

Tobias looks confused. "I wasn't aware there was more than one."

"Son, I don't know what you're up to –" the man begins.

"We aren't up to anything," Tobias says, remaining calm. "Our city doesn't have a name. Maybe you've heard of us. We are the Dauntless."

"Dauntless? Like, fearless?" The man says, scoffing. "Are y'all like a band or something?"

Tobias begins to look irritated. "We are a faction. And we were just released from our city, and intend to see for ourselves what lies beyond the fences."

"The fences?" The man says, suddenly serious. "You're from Chicago, aren't you?"

"I told you our city doesn't have a name."

"It did, once. You got this big building with two spokes sticking out of the top of it? And a giant marsh right next door?"

"Yes." Tobias nods. "That's our city. I've never heard it called… What was it again?"

"Chicago," the man says. "Look, it's freezing out here, and most of you look like kids. Do you want a ride somewhere? The back of my truck's empty, and I think you'd all fit."

Tobias looks down at me, back at Zeke, Uriah, and Christina. I nod, while they stare at him with blank expressions. He glances around at the others, some of whom nod as well.

"Where exactly would you take us?" Tobias asks the man.

"Anywhere east of here," he says. "I'm heading to Virginia Beach."

The word "beach" tickles my ears. I'd seen beaches in photographs and videos in school, in textbooks in science classes, but I never thought I would see one. I didn't think they still existed.

"Anyone who wants to come with us," Tobias says to the group of Dauntless, "step forward now."

Every single Dauntless steps forward.

The man, who finally introduces himself as Jacob, helps us all into the back of his truck. In all, there are forty-three of us, so it's a tight fit, and it would be very dark if it weren't for the few people who had brought flashlights. I never knew a vehicle this big existed, except for trains, but this seems to drive the same as a car or pickup truck, although it looks nothing like either. Again, I find myself curled in a corner with Tobias, his blue quilt over us like a tent, trying to keep some warmth in.

"I can't believe we're doing this," he says, his deep blue eyes bright in the semi-dark. He runs his fingertips over my jawbone, down the side of my neck, over my collarbone. I still wear the camisole and the jacket I'd worn the night before, and his fingers trail under the lapel of my jacket. I shiver. He smiles broadly, and kisses me firmly on the lips.

"Hey, you two!" Christina shouts from outside the blanket. "Just cuz you're in your own little world doesn't mean the rest of us aren't here!"

I laugh, and we both poke our heads out from under the blanket.

"That's better," she says with a mock scolding tone in her voice. "I'm gonna have to keep my eye on you two."

Zeke is laughing behind his fist, but Uriah stares off into the darkness and silently takes another swig from his flask. I wonder how much alcohol he brought with him. He can't have that much.

I lean against Tobias, my head nestling into the hollow beneath his chest bone, and listen to his breaths as I doze off.


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N - Hey everyone! This chapter took me a while to write, simply because I had so many things to think about! Which cities were still active? How would Tris and the others react to the vastness of the world? How were they going to eat and fuel the truck? I also am using Route 80 (a real interstate highway which happens to pass very close to my house) and Tris, Tobias, and the Dauntless gang will be following it's real route. Enjoy!**

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"Bathroom break!" Jacob's voice shouts from outside the truck, and I hear a fist pounding on the sheet metal. The door at the rear of the truck slides upward, and through squinted eyes I see the old man standing silhouetted in the bright sunlight. I glance at my watch, as I rub the sleep from my eyes, and realize it's after eleven o'clock.

"I can't believe we slept so long," I say to Tobias, standing up and making my way to the open door. Judging by how stiff my muscles are, I don't think I've moved an inch since I dozed off.

"_You_ did," he says, absently rubbing the spot on his chest where my head sat for several hours. "I couldn't wake you. You finally looked like you were actually resting."

"Thanks," I say, feeling a bit guilty. "Did you guys get any sleep at all?"

"Zeke and Christina crashed pretty shortly after you did, but I stayed awake. And Uriah…" Tobias glances at Uriah as he jumps out of the truck ahead of us.

"He tried to fall asleep," Tobias whispers to me. "He woke up pretty shaken up, and didn't close his eyes again."

I look at Uriah as I jump from the back of the truck. His dark, kind eyes look hard today, and they're red around the rims. His usually-bronze skin has an ashen tint to it, and he still holds the flask in his right hand.

Tobias jumps to the ground, and whispers to me, "He's out. He's bound to have a raging headache about now. I don't think he's been truly sober since Lynn…"

"I know." One look at Uriah tells me that was the straw that broke his back. _And now he can't even protect Shauna and Hec like he promised her_, I think sadly. "I wonder why he decided to come with us."

"Zeke wouldn't leave without him. They're the only family they've got."

I look over my shoulder, away from Tobias, and finally take notice of where we are. We're on the side of the highway, and a few hundred yards away is a complex of buildings. Three rectangular concrete buildings stand in a the shape of an H, and I am reminded of the simplicity of the Abnegation sector.

The idea of walking toward a set of buildings and having no idea who might be inside, makes me reach for Tobias, but he slips his hand behind my back before I can grab it. I feel something heavy and ice cold against the skin of my lower back. A gun. Tobias slides it beneath my waistband and puts his finger to his lips as he lets my jacket fall over the handle.

I freeze, knowing that the last time a gun touched my skin, I essentially had to commit suicide. Or murder… I'm not really sure.

"Just in case," Tobias whispers, glancing at his back where I see the outline of a gun under his waistband as well.

He takes my hand and pulls me toward the buildings, as I try to fight off images of my doppelganger… of Will…

As we get closer, I see black lettering on the buildings. The center building is labeled **COMMISSARY AND FUEL**, while the building to the left is labeled **MALE** and the building to the right is labeled **FEMALE**. Restrooms, I assume.

"They're still using liquid fuel?" Zeke smirks. "Seriously? That stuff is ancient."

"Well, it doesn't look like there's any place to charge a battery out here, bro," Uriah says irritably.

Zeke glares at Uriah, who walks off toward the commissary, probably to find out if there's any alcohol there.

"Come on," Christina says, making me jump. I hadn't realized she was behind me; the icy metal pressed into my skin was keeping me thoroughly distracted. Christina grabs my hand and tugs me toward the building marked **FEMALE**. I break away from Tobias's grip, apprehensive of leaving him, but he nods reassuringly, then heads off toward the left with Zeke.

Christina pushes on a rusted metal door, which was once painted the same color as the concrete surrounding it. With a decent shove, she manages to get the door open wide enough that we can slip through. I can tell no one has been in this long, narrow room for quite a while. In the small strip of light from the door, I can see that the row of sinks along one wall is covered in a layer of dust about an inch thick, and every time Christina or I take a step, I cough as a cloud billows up from the floor. I push my way into one of the stalls across the room from the sinks. I take a deep breath, close my eyes, and close my hand around the handle of the gun, removing it from my waistband and gently placing it on the floor. I imagine I am back in our clean white apartment as I do what is absolutely necessary.

Christina and I stumble out of the restroom a few seconds later, the gun again secured in my waistband, and realize our black clothes have accumulated a layer of light gray dust. Shaking and brushing ourselves off, we walk to the center of the square where Zeke and Tobias already wait. They too are covered in dust.

"_That_ was an experience," Christina says.

"To say the least," I add. "Let's go see about getting something to eat. We should probably save up Zeke's stash."

"Shh!" Zeke says. "Not everyone needs to know about that. Forty-three Dauntless would finish off that pack as a snack."

We all laugh as we walk toward the commissary.

We find Uriah sitting just inside the door on a bench, empty handed and glaring at the floor.

"No luck, bro?" Zeke asks.

"It's probably for the best, Uri," Christina says gently, sitting down next to him. "The more you drink, the harder it'll be to stop."

Uriah glances up at her, then glares at the ground again.

"Trust me," she says quietly. "After Will, I… Let's just say the other night wasn't the first time I've gotten sick like that. Not by a long shot."

I am shocked. I had no idea Christina had been drinking like that. But then, I wasn't really a part of her life at the time. Uriah looks up into Christina's face again, and catches her gaze. He nods, and to me it seems like he's agreeing to give life another chance.

Tobias and I walk toward a set of shelves across the room, which seem to stock all sorts of foods and drinks. There are bottles of water on one shelf, sitting next to bottles full of strange concoctions in all different colors. I wonder if these are the fizzy drinks Caleb says are served at the Erudite compound. I recognize some of the words on the bottles as names of fruits I've heard of but never tried; orange, grape, lemon. Others don't even look like English to me. Who knows? Maybe they aren't.

Then I spot a bottle with an apple on it. I've had apple juice before, when I visited Amity with my parents as a child, so I hope this is the same. I take it, and a few bottles of water as well. Then I look over my shoulder and see Tobias's head above the shelves a few rows down. I walk to him and see that he is holding several boxes of strange foods. I snatch one from him.

"Beef jerky?" I ask. "Is this anything like a hamburger?"

He laughs. "Not exactly. It's still beef, but it's dried. Jacob says it's pretty good."

I glance down the aisle and Jacob waves at us with a toothless grin. I can't help but smile back. I don't know why, but this factionless stranger makes me feel at ease. Maybe it's because he's not really factionless. He's just… without a faction.

"How do we pay for this, Jacob?" I ask. "We don't have any money."

"The commissary don't need money," he says. "Hardly anybody comes through here anymore, so there are places like this along the highway for folks like me. Everybody's on the coast now. Ain't nobody left out west, 'cept Omaha."

"Omaha?" I ask.

"Yep. It's about five hundred miles west of Chicago. Y'all are lucky I was headed back this way. There's only a couple of us left out here now."

"What do you mean?" Tobias asks.

"Me and a couple other guys bring news and supplies back and forth from the coast to the outlying cities," Jacob explains.

"We've never seen any outsiders in our city," I say.

"We ain't allowed to go to Chicago. They even took the exit off route eighty and everything. Y'all were supposed to be something special."

"So we've heard." I roll my eyes.

"Where are we now?" Tobias asks, not that any names he might give us would make any sense. They swirl in my mind; Chicago, Omaha…

"We're about twenty miles south of what used to be Toledo, Ohio, before the war. Only about another eight hours to the coast, if we stay on this road. I can drop y'all off there, or I can take ya down to Virginia with me. I'll let you decide when we get to New York. I've gotta stop there anyway."

_Chicago, Omaha, Toledo, Ohio, Virginia, New York…_ My mind is completely overwhelmed. None of these words mean anything to me. I look up at Tobias, and he nods at Jacob. "We're going to need a map."


	8. Chapter 8

I twist the cap off the bottle with the apple on it, and sniff the contents. It certainly smells like apples, even though my nose is overwhelmed by the scent of the gasoline tanks Jacob packed with us. My mind is momentarily transported back to the Amity orchards. I take a sip and as the sweet, thick concoction flows over my tongue, I can't help but grin.

"This is delicious," I say to Tobias, handing him the bottle. "Try it."

"I've had apple juice before, Tris," he says with a smirk.

"So have I, but this is different. Just try it."

Tobias takes a sip, and his wide eyes and grin tell me that he's never tried anything like this before. I smirk. "Good, right?" He smiles at me, a smile that would make my knees buckle if I wasn't already sitting in the back of Jacob's truck again.

"So, have you figured out anything about these places Jacob was talking about?" I ask Tobias, leaning over to see the map he holds. With a red marker, he has placed a circle around Chicago, our home.

"It looks like almost every place he mentioned was along the east coast," he says, placing his finger on the place where green meets blue on the map. "Here's Boston." Tobias points to a northern spot on the coast, practically in the water. "And New York." Another spot that seemed to exist too close to the water.

"What about Omaha?" I ask. "Where is that?"

Tobias folds the map over so the coast disappears, and all I can see is green, with the circle around Chicago at the right of the map.

"Here," he says, pointing to a spot in the middle of the continent. "What I can't figure out is why there isn't anybody left west of there." I look across the map and see that between Omaha and the west coast is a great expanse of land. Hundreds upon hundreds of miles of uninhabited land. I shiver at the thought.

"So, where is it we're going again?" I ask.

Tobias folds the map again and points to New York. I squint and see that the dot indicating the city is actually on a tiny island. A rush of excitement flows through my body, almost as if I had stuck my finger in an electrical socket.

"We're going to see the ocean," I whisper.

Tobias smiles at me, and my heart races. I never dreamed I would see the ocean. He leans in and kisses me on the lips. "So it seems."

"Is it near that beach he talked about? Virgin-something?"

"Virginia. And not really." Tobias points at a spot along the coast much further south. "It's here."

"Oh." I feel a little bit deflated. "Well, maybe there's a beach in New York too."

He nods. I glance across the truck. Zeke is asleep again, but Christina and Uriah are sitting close together. Uriah looks like he's been hit by a train, but Christina hands him a bottle of water every few minutes, instructing him to take sips. She really does understand him. I watch as their eyes meet for a moment, but they both quickly look away, Uriah at the ground, Christina at her hands.

I lean against Tobias and he wraps his arm around my waist under the blanket. His long, cool fingers brush the skin just above my hip, and I shiver. I check to make sure Christina didn't notice anything, since she seems to be so attuned to anything Tobias and I do lately, but she doesn't even glance in our direction. I look up at Tobias out of the corner of my eye and see his smirk. He felt the shiver. My cheeks heat up as I look around at the rest of the Dauntless in the truck. The green-haired man sits with a young girl pressed against his side. She has long black hair with a bright purple streak down one side of her face. Her deep brown eyes stand out against her pale skin, and I realize how young she really is. No more than twelve.

I imagine what it must be like for her. She'll never have a Choosing Ceremony. She'll grow up never knowing what faction she belongs in. _Does that even matter anymore?_ I really don't know. I smile at her and she smiles back, then nuzzles her head into her father's arm and closes her eyes.

She is the youngest person in our group, and I wonder why her father decided to bring her. Tobias catches me looking at the little family, and whispers in my ear. "That's Ivan, and his daughter Harley. Her mother, April, didn't make it through the attack on Erudite."

I don't know what to say. "At least she still has her father," I whisper back. Then it hits me. Both of Tobias's parents are still alive, but he's more of an orphan than I am. My parents sacrificed themselves for me, but his used him, hurt him, and betrayed him from the moment he was born. "Tobias," I whisper, looking up at him as tears well up in my eyes.

He strokes my hair and pulls me close to him. "Shh," he says. "It's alright. I know." I pull the blue quilt up over my head and silent tears roll down my cheeks. Tobias's strong arms hold me as I cry for him, for myself, for Harley and Uriah and Shauna…

Eventually, my eyes dry, and my head begins to pound. I pull the blanket away from my face as I feel the truck begin to slow, then drive over uneven ground. Then we come to a stop.

Jacob throws open the rear door, and removes the fuel tanks. The cold breeze hits my face, and I drink it in like ice water. I can't believe how much the scent of the diesel fuel had been affecting me, but I feel like I've come up for air after being underwater for too long. My head feels clear for the first time in hours.

"Jacob!" I shout, just as he is about to pull the door back down. "Can you leave that open for a while?"

Jacob shrugs. "It'll get real windy in here," he says.

"At least while you refuel the truck?" I ask.

"Yeah, sure. I'll be back to close it in a few minutes."

Jacob leaves with the fuel, and we all breathe deeply. Then I notice a small hatch in the ceiling. I stand, but I'm not nearly tall enough to reach it. Tobias calls Zeke over, who woke up when the truck came to a stop, and they lift me onto their shoulders so I can reach. I reach above my head, unlock the hatch, and push, my right shoulder and my left hand screaming in pain. The hatch finally pushes free and reveals the blue sky above me. When Jacob returns to close the door, he remarks that he meant to open that earlier, but forgot. I roll my eyes.

As the truck begins to move again, the cold air whips in from the hatch, and we all huddle together underneath our various blankets and sweaters and jackets. I find myself again pinned between Tobias and Christina, and I lay there perfectly still, feeling the warmth from their bodies finally beginning to fill the hole in mine.


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N - Hello again! First, thank you all SOOO MUCH for your compliments. I can't believe people can compare me to Veronica Roth. I'm so flattered, and I wonder for your sanity... lol. THANK YOU! I hope you enjoy this next chapter!**

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After night has settled over the road and the stars have come out, I catch an unfamiliar scent on the icy air. I feel the truck slow and suddenly we are plunged into pitch darkness. The starlight coming through the hatch has been blocked by something, and I grasp at Tobias's arm as he clutches me closer.

Just when I feel like I'm beginning to drown in the darkness, the truck emerges into light. This time, it's not starlight or moonlight shining down on us through the square opening, but artificial amber light. A salty smell hits my nose, and I have no idea where we are when the truck comes to a halt.

Jacob pushes up the door on the rear of the truck, and I see that we are surrounded by tall buildings. For a half a second, I think we are home again, but the smell tells me that's impossible. The Dauntless step out of the truck and into the artificial light of a city street. I am keenly aware of the gun pressed to my lower back, and instinctively know that Tobias has his too. He jumps down first, then turns and lifts me from the vehicle. His hands slide under my long jacket, and his fingers again brush the skin just under the hem of my shirt. He smiles, anticipating the shiver that he knows his touch will cause, and kisses me on the lips as he places me on the ground.

If the kiss hadn't taken my breath away, I would gasp as I realize that I am standing in the center of a vast city. Unlike our home, _Chicago_, there doesn't seem to be a single light out, and a glance at my watch tells me it's well after midnight. Then a chill creeps up my back that has nothing to do with the cold. Every single one of these buildings seems to be occupied, and a few people wander the streets without giving us a second glance.

A woman in high heels and a short white skirt walks two large, fluffy dogs down one sidewalk. A man in a suit carrying a briefcase hurries down another, speaking anxiously to himself. No one seems to pay any attention to us.

"Welcome to New York!" Jacob says with another toothless grin. I can't help but smile back, as apprehensive as I feel.

"Are there factions here?" Christina pipes up. "I'd love to see what the New York Dauntless are like."  
"No factions here, missy," Jacob says. "Just people."

"No factions?" she asks. The rest of the group seems be of the same mind, and everyone starts to whisper. Little Harley catches my eye for a moment, and she looks frightened. My heart aches for her until Tobias's voice breaks me out of my own head.

"Relax, everyone. Calm down," he shouts. Ever the leader, whether he wanted to be or not. My father always said we should give power to those who don't want it. The Dauntless slowly fall silent. "Jacob," Tobias says, "is there anywhere we can stay tonight? Maybe somewhere warm? As kind as you were to drive us here, I don't think any of us can bear to get back into your truck."

"Yeah, sure. I'll take y'all to the Center," Jacob replies.

"What's the Center?" asks Uriah. I am shocked to hear him speak, but I don't let it show on my face.

"It's a place for people from other places to get settled," Jacob says. "They'll feed ya, give ya a place to sleep. No charge."

"How Abnegation of them," Zeke snickers.

"What now?" Jacob looks at him, confused.

"Abnegation. It's one of our factions. They –"

"Zeke, don't bother," Tobias interrupts. "You'll confuse him."

Jacob looks mildly offended for a second, then shrugs and begins to lead us down one of the brightly lit streets. We pass building after building and cross street after street. Jacob seems to be getting tired, but I'm used to racing everywhere I go, so I only notice the sights of the city as we pass through it. I stare at the people walking past us, who all look like a strange mix of factions. Spiked hair and a nose piercing on a girl in a blue dress. A tight bun and a pair of pink flat-heeled shoes showing above and below a long black overcoat on another young woman. A man with a tangled beard and a red jacket pushing a cart down an alley. I've never seen such strange people.

We stop in front of a tall building, which reminds me of the Hub. It is made of steel and glass, and lighted windows make the top of the building sparkle. My head spins as I try to see the top of it from the ground.

"Welcome to the Center," Jacob says. "Just go on in, and tell 'em who you are. I've got to leave ya here."

Jacob stretches out a hand, which Tobias takes awkwardly. He's not used to the strange greeting any more than I am.

"Thank you for everything," he says.

Jacob nods, then strides off in the direction of his truck.

Tobias clasps my hand, and together we push through the huge glass doors into a wide room. This could be Candor headquarters. The floor is black and white marble, while the walls are all made of glass. Maybe Erudite… A strange mixture of both. Just like everything else in this city.

Sitting at a desk, the lone piece of furniture in the room, behind a computer screen is a young woman no older than I am. Her auburn hair tangles around her face in curls, and she stares at the screen. Tobias and I walk up to the desk.

"Welcome to the Population Center. Can I help you?" she asks, in yet another strange accent. She seems bored.

"We need a place to stay," I say.

"We've just come from Chicago," Tobias clarifies. "We were told that you would be able to provide for us."

"Chicago?" We have her attention. Her light blue eyes glance over me, then lock onto Tobias's. A surge of heat spreads through my stomach, even though I'm the one holding his hand.

"Yes," he says.

"And how many are you?"

"Forty-three altogether."

"So you need forty-three rooms?" the girl asks skeptically. "I don't know if I have –"

"Uhm, no," Tobias confesses. "Just a moment." He turns to the group of Dauntless who wait anxiously behind us. "Decide amongst yourselves how many rooms we need. If you're willing or able to share, please do so. We wouldn't want to inconvenience…" He turns back to the girl. "I'm sorry, what was your name?"

"Megan," she replies, a light pink blush spreading across her freckled cheeks. My stomach churns again.

"Megan," Tobias repeats to the crowd.

After a few moments, the Dauntless have split up into ten groups. Tobias, Zeke, Uriah, Christina, and I will share a room with Ivan and Harley.

We turn back to Megan. "We will need ten rooms," Tobias says. "Please," he adds.

"Sure. I can get you ten." Megan clicks her long fingernails on the keys of her computer, taps the screen a few times, then smiles. "You're in luck. There are ten rooms on the fourteenth floor of this building. They're all yours, if you want them."

Tobias gives her the smile that, when directed at me, makes my knees turn to jelly, and says, "Thank you."

As we turn away, Megan hands Tobias a stack of black cards and says, "Here. These are for purchasing food and supplies. There are ten of them. Each one has a few thousand dollars on it, but be careful. That goes quick."

I have no idea what a dollar is, but it doesn't matter to me. All I want is to get away from the girl who can steal Tobias's smiles from me.

In the elevator, I angrily hit the button for the fourteenth floor. Tobias looks down at me and his eyebrows pull together. "What's wrong?" he asks.

"Nothing. I'm just… being stupid. I'll be fine," I reply. I really don't feel like talking about this in an elevator full of Dauntless.

I follow Tobias and Zeke down the hall on the fourteenth floor, walking with Christina and Uriah.

"He was just using his charm to get us in. You know that, right?" Christina says, poking me in the ribs. "He's not even his type. He goes for short, blonde, and Divergent, remember?"

I can't help but crack a smile.

Tobias passes out the cards, one to each group, then we enter our room. Number 1465. When I push open the door, my jaw drops. This isn't a room. This isn't even an apartment. I don't have words for what this space is, but it's huge. We walk into a living room with a fireplace and floor to ceiling windows overlooking the city. All the lights are dazzling as they reflect off the marble and glass surfaces, and I can see now that the city spans much farther than I thought. _Is there even a factionless sector here?_ I wonder. Turning to my right, I see a hallway with several doors. Christina bounds down the hall, and opens the first door on her left.

"Bedroom!" she shouts back to us. She proceeds to open every door along the hallway, revealing three more bedrooms, a bathroom, and a closet.

I am completely overwhelmed as Tobias leads me down the hallway to the door at the very end. The bedroom is huge, with a black marble floor like the lobby downstairs, and a large bed with white sheets and a black comforter. I toss my jacket and bag onto the bed, happy to be rid of them for a few moments. An open door in the corner catches me off guard, and I pull away from Tobias to investigate. I find a small bathroom, half of which is taken up by a gray stone shower, complete with a bench. _That would've been nice after the initiation fights_, I think.

I hear the bedroom door click shut behind me, and then Tobias is there, his chest pressed to my back and his hands on my hips. He kisses my neck, my ear, my cheek. "You have nothing to be jealous of," he says as he gently tugs upward at the hem of my shirt, asking for permission. My cheeks burn, but I lift my arms over my head. In an instant, my shirt is on the ground and I have spun around to face him. As we kiss deeply, more clothes are discarded, and we stumble toward the shower.

* * *

**A/N - SOOOO... Will they or won't they? You'll have to wait til next time to find out. ;) And just as I side note, to repeat what I posted earlier, if two characters have sex, it will be made obvious, but I will not be putting much detail into the writing itself, for the sake of my younger readers. I also have family reading this story who will refuse to read further if I put too much sexual detail into the writing. If you're interested in seeing my take on the Four/Tris relationship, check out my short story, "Six". To see if Tobias and Tris actually DO have sex in this scene, you'll have to wait until the next chapter is posted! Love to all my followers!**


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N - Here's the next installment! For those of you concerned about Uriah and Christina, don't worry. They will be happy EVENTUALLY, just not yet. In the world of Divergent, something always gets in the way. ;)**

* * *

Tobias's fingertips run lightly over the skin of my stomach while the water from the shower soaks my bra and underwear. When he tried to push the straps from my shoulder, a small voice in my head said, _Stop!_, so I had pushed his hand away. He didn't seem the least bit daunted, and left his shorts on too. Like some kind of agreement.

He kisses me firmly on the mouth as I sit astride his lap on the bench, the hot water running over my body. My name escapes his lips, caught somewhere between a sigh and a groan. Tobias locks his hands around my hips, and pulls me closer to him until we are almost one person. Just a jumble of limbs. He squeezes my hips and I move with him, our breaths mingling as he kisses my neck, my collarbone…

I jump out of my skin as the door bangs open.

"Tris, I –" Christina shouts, her voice catching in her throat. "Oh my God, I'm sorry," she says quietly, backing out of the bathroom.

I turn back to Tobias and we both begin to laugh. I stand, then sink to the bench next to him, completely dissolving into hysterics. Then suddenly the laugh catches in my throat. I can't breathe. I gasp for air as tears mix with the shower water running down my cheeks, and a sob escapes my mouth. I slap my hands over my face, and look up at Tobias, mortified.

The events of the last few days had been keeping all of the feelings from the preceding weeks at bay, but now that I feel safe, nothing seems able to hold them back. More sobs escape around my hand.

Tobias places his hand on my back, and rubs his thumb over the space between my shoulder blades. He doesn't say anything, which I am thankful for. The worst thing he could do is tell me everything is going to be okay when it so clearly isn't. There's no way my parents could come back. No way to bring back Will or Marlene or Lynn. No way to change what Caleb did. Tobias wraps his arms around me, and I lean into him. He squeezes me tightly and I feel like he's trying to wring me out like a sponge, until all the tears and sadness and hurt have left me.

When I finally choke back the sobs, I lean my head on my hands and rest my elbows on my knees. I breathe deeply, my inhales catching occasionally, as Tobias just sits near me. Sometimes, his nearness is all I need. I begin to calm down.

"I'm gonna go take an actual shower," he says. "Are you okay for now?"

"Yeah." I nod. "I'm okay."

In reality, I have no idea if I'm going to be okay. But for now, I can stand and clean myself off. Tobias steps from the shower, wraps a towel around his waist, and leaves the room. I peel off my soaked bra and underwear and toss them into the sink. I rub soap over my body and hair and scrub furiously, like if I scrub hard enough, maybe the soap will remove the memories as well as the dirt and sweat.

When I turn off the water forty minutes later, I look at my body in the huge mirror across from the shower. My bruises are healing, giving large portions of my thighs and abdomen a strange yellowish cast, and the rest of my skin is scrubbed raw and red. My eyes look more deeply set than normal, and they are puffy with tears and exhaustion. I wrap a soft white towel around my body, and shuffle out of the bathroom. Christina sits on the bed.

"Hey," she says.

I blush, remembering what she walked in on earlier. "Hey."

"I'm really sorry about… I mean, I should have knocked…" She doesn't seem to want to meet my eyes.

"It's fine. Really."

"Are you okay?"

She had heard me crying. Honestly, the entire floor had probably heard me. "Yeah. I'll be fine."

I see tears welling up in Christina's eyes as I sit down next to her. "What's wrong?" I ask.

"It's… It's everything," she says as a single tear slips down her cheek. "Marlene, Lynn, Uriah…" She looks at me, and I know what she's thinking. _And Will._

"Uriah will be alright," I say. "He's stopped drinking, hasn't he?"

"Not by choice. And he hardly even speaks anymore."

I too had noticed Uriah's strange silence. He's not acting like the happy-go-lucky leader of the Dauntless-borns anymore.

"I…" Christina begins. Her face contorts as she struggles to find the right words. "I like him, Tris."

"I like him, too. He's our friend."

"No, I mean…" Another tear escapes her eye, leaving a streak down her face. "Like I liked Will," she finishes in almost a whisper.

My mind is blank. I wasn't expecting this. "Oh," I say.

"I don't want to. I feel like… like I'm cheating on Will. And like I'm betraying Marlene," she says, more tears streaming out of her eyes. She covers her face with her hands and quietly sobs. I'm tired of feeling like I don't know what to say. So I sit next to my best friend on a bed in my towel in a strange city, take her hand in mine, and lean my head on her shoulder.

"You should get dressed," she chokes out a few minutes later, sniffling.

"Yeah, probably." I stand and begin to rummage through my bag, where I find a pair of Tobias's sweat pants. I pull them on under the towel, then escape to the bathroom to throw on a t-shirt. When I come back, Christina is curled up in a ball on the bed.

"I'm not ready to have these feelings, Tris," she whispers.

"I know," I say. "I know what I've lost is different but –"

"No, you understand," she says. "Probably better than anyone."

I lay behind her and wrap my arms around her waist. She's so tall that I lean my head against her shoulder blade. I try to think of what my mother would say, what _Christina's_ mother might say, with her Candor honesty. "Just give it time," is what I come up with. She nods and sniffs again.

Then I hear a soft knock at the door, and I sit up instantly alert, my eyes flickering to the bathroom where I left my gun.

"Tris?" Zeke. "Is Christina in there? She's supposed to bunk with us so Ivan and Harley can have a room, but I can't find her."

I look down at Christina who shakes her head violently. "Yeah, she's in here. Can you ask Tobias to bunk with you two tonight? I think we need a girls' night."

"Yeah, sure," Zeke calls back, sounding confused. I hear his footsteps recede down the hall.

"Thanks," Christina says.

"No problem." I lie down again and roll onto my back, then notice a flat, black screen hanging on the wall across from the bed. "What is t_hat_?" I exclaim, jumping up and walking over to it.

"It's a television," Christina says. Her tone mimics the tone she used when she explained to me what a hamburger was. "Tris, your Abnegation is showing."

I blush, and Christina walks over to the television. She waves her hand in front of it, saying, "On," and the screen lights up blue. We settle for some sort of ancient movie about a girl and a horse, and settle back onto the bed. Christina's stomach growls, and I pick up the telephone on the bedside table and dial the number listed for the kitchen. A young man picks up.

"Hello. This is the kitchen. How can I help you?"

"Uhm," I say awkwardly. Abnegation didn't leave me with very good telephone skills either. "We'd like to order something to eat."

"Okay," the man says, sounding impatient. "What can I get for you?"

"Hamburgers!" Christina says into the phone, leaning over my shoulders.

As I shoo her away, the young man asks, "How many, and how would you like them cooked?"

"Uh…" I cover the receiver with my hand. "Maybe you should handle this, Chris."

I hand her the phone, and she orders ten cheeseburgers, which turn out to be the same as hamburgers, only with a slice of yellow cheese on top. She tells the man in the kitchen that they should be cooked "medium," whatever that means.

"Thanks. We're in room 1465," she says, then she hangs up the phone. "You've never spoken on a telephone before, have you?" she says with a small, knowing smile.

"No, I have. I once called Susan when she was sick so I could read her our algebra problems," I say. In truth, Caleb had dialed the phone for me, and all I had to do was read aloud from my textbook. I had gone over to Susan's house, but after a lengthy argument with herself, Susan's mother had refused to allow me to enter out of fear that I could get sick as well. She argued about whether it was right to allow me to enter to selflessly help her daughter, or whether it was right to prevent me from entering, thereby forcing her daughter to be selfless, the whole time concerned that she wasn't being selfless enough herself. She only stopped worrying when Caleb suggested that I just read Susan the problems over the phone instead. That was the first time I considered leaving Abnegation. At fourteen, it was too confusing to be selfless all the time. All the same, that night I made them dinner and dropped it off, making sure Susan didn't need anything more.

A few moments later, a doorbell sounds, and a short blond boy pushes a cart laden with cheeseburgers into our living room. "Fifty-three dollars," the boy says. Tobias hands the boy his card, which he scans using some sort of handheld machine. Then he hands the card back to Tobias and leaves.

We all sit on the plush white sofas, looking out the windows at the city as we eat. Uriah finishes quickly, then ducks back into the room he and Zeke have claimed, the one right next to mine. Zeke follows shortly after.

I catch little Harley staring at me again, and I smile at her. This time, she shows me a small smile in return. "You're Tris, right?" she asks, although she clearly already knows.

"Yes."

"The first jumper, Divergent, _and_ dating a Dauntless leader. Wow," she says.

I laugh. "Well, I'm glad you're not afraid of me, at least."

"My girl's not afraid of anything, are you?" Ivan says, mussing Harley's hair, mixing purple strands with black ones.

"_Dad!_" she whines, flattening her locks back down. He just laughs, and when Harley tries to muss his green spikes, I find myself laughing too. Harley's deep brown eyes flash as she laughs, and I see hints of gold in them. I find myself thinking that she would look quite a bit like Christina in a few years, with the exception of her pale skin.

After we've all finished eating, I kiss Tobias on the lips and thank him for letting Christina stay with me tonight. "I'll explain everything tomorrow," I whisper to him.

"No need," he says. "Just do what you have to."

I smile at him. I wonder whether my smile makes him weak at the knees like his does to me. I doubt it. Nothing could make the mighty Four weak. I follow Christina back to my room and gently close the door behind us.

* * *

**A/N - How do you guys like Ivan and Harley so far? They will become more important soon. And yes, I know the Four/Tris moment was a bit of a teaser, but they'll get there. Don't forget, Tris still has a fear of intimacy to get over, so please don't be mad at me! :)**


	11. Chapter 11

"Holy. Crap." Christina stops dead just outside the glass door of our apartment building. I walk into her back. One of these days, my Dauntless reaction time will kick in and I _won't_ walk into the person in front of me, but apparently that day isn't today. I rub my nose as I walk around Christina. Then I realize what she's looking at.

There are people everywhere. They flow down the sidewalks like a river, and there are more cars than I've ever seen in one place driving down the streets. I watch as four cars pass us before I can count to ten. One of them even still shines.

The rest of our little group push out the door, shoving Christina and I forward onto the sidewalk. I hear Harley gasp, and see her reach for Ivan's hand in my peripheral vision. Tobias takes mine, and I look up at him. His deep eyes sparkle, and I have to look away before I get lost in them.

"Wow," Uriah whispers quietly. This is the first time I've heard him speak since we arrived in New York. "Tobias," he says quietly. "I want to see the ocean."

I had almost forgotten. "We're on an island!" That explains the salty smell in the air. "Tobias, we have to go." I look up at him again, pleading with my eyes. He smiles down at me and nods.

A small laugh escapes my lips, and I look down at Harley. Her dark eyes meet mine and her face reflects what I feel. A perfect mixture of nerves and excitement. "Wanna see the ocean?" I ask her.

"Dad, can we?" she looks up at Ivan, who looks at Tobias and me.

"I have some plans with a few of the others," he says to us. "She's Dauntless. She'll be fine."

Harley squeals, and I realize that Dauntless parents aren't really used to giving permission.

"She'll be safe with us. I promise," Tobias says as Harley releases her father's hand and takes mine. She can hardly contain her excitement. Ivan musses her hair again as he turns and walks back into the building. She purses her lips as she flattens it out. Then the giddy smile returns.

"How do we get there?" she asks me.

I turn to Tobias. "How _do_ we get there?"

Tobias thinks for a moment, then puts his hands around his mouth and shouts, "My girlfriend wants to know how to get to the ocean! Who can help us?"

About ten different people stop and point up the street. Zeke whoops and takes off at a sprint. Tobias grabs my hand, and I hold Harley's. She grabs Christina's and soon, a chain of Dauntless is sprinting down the street toward the ocean we can't see yet.

Our breaths form clouds in front of our faces as we sprint through the icy morning air. I realize how out of shape I have become in the last few weeks when I notice not only Tobias pulling me onward, but Harley as well. I roll my eyes and push my legs harder. As I run, the feelings of last night come back, but instead of crying, I feel them being released as every breath that condenses in front of me. In every foot that pounds the ground. In every inch of smile spread across my face.

My legs are numb and I'm beginning to wheeze when we finally begin to slow. I jog right up to a long black railing. I can almost feel the icy water on my skin as I look over the railing. What I my eyes see and what my mind sees do not agree.

I can see the blue water that my mind sees, but it is miles away, closer to the horizon than it is to me. Between us and the water lies an all-too-familiar marshland, only this one has a distinct salty, musky odor. Harley sighs. "I can hardly see it," she says sadly.

"I'm sorry, honey," I say. "Maybe we'll see it another time."

"Yeah, maybe the tide's just out," Zeke says.

I glare at him. "Did you pay attention _at all_ in science class? The tide doesn't travel miles and miles like that."

"Do you really think we can believe everything the Erudite taught us?" he asks. "For all we know, the moon actually _is_ made of cheese."

I can't help but laugh at his use of the ancient expression, but seeing how sad Harley looks snaps me out of it. I pat her on the shoulder.

Just then, an impossibly loud, high pitched siren screams out from somewhere above our heads. I slap my hands over my ears as the sound seems to reverberate inside my skull. Everyone else does the same. I see a strange vehicle which huge tires coming across the marsh toward us. After a few moments, the siren stops, and I remove my hands, half expecting to see them covered in blood. They aren't, but that doesn't make the pain in my ears any better.

The vehicle pulls right up to the railing, up a ramp, and onto the street. A window rolls down, and a mud-covered man leans out.

"You all should get out of here. You heard the siren. The tide's coming in," he says urgently.

Zeke looks pleased with himself. I give him a scowl, then turn toward the man in the strange vehicle, but it is already driving off. Then I turn back toward the far-off ocean. Strangely, it doesn't seem so far off anymore. I can even see the whites at the tops of some of the waves.

"Tobias," I say. "I think it's coming closer."

"Really?" Christina and Harley both exclaim. I hadn't realized until then that Christina is just as excited as the young girl. I stop and think for a moment about how Harley really _isn't_ that young, especially by Dauntless standards. She's old enough to work in the shops after school, and in less than four years, she will take her aptitude test and undoubtedly choose Dauntless. _She would have chosen Dauntless_, I think. I feel a mixture of sadness and happiness. I am happy that Harley won't have to go through the initiation that Christina, Uriah, and I did under Eric's vicious eyes. But I also feel sad that she won't get the chance to prove herself. Or make another choice if she wanted to.

Fifteen minutes later, I can clearly see the line of waves marching slowly toward us. It's still far off, but the ocean is definitely coming closer. How could Zeke be right? How could the tide cover so much land?

I don't get a chance to answer those questions. I hear a shuffle on the pavement behind us, and spin, drawing my gun. People in blue and white uniforms surround us, their guns pointed at us as well.

"Drop the weapons!" yells a gruff voice from behind a helmet visor. "Now!"

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Tobias slowly lower his gun and lay it on the ground. I reluctantly do the same, using my unoccupied left hand to keep Harley behind me.

Zeke starts toward our captors, fists raised, Uriah close behind, but Tobias shouts, "No!" They both fall back. Christina stands dumbfounded, and I feel numb. The memories of being a prisoner in Erudite headquarters stir in my mind, and I begin to feel sick. I grab onto Tobias's arm so I don't fall.

"What's the problem?" Tobias asks the armed group carefully. "Have we done something wrong? We're not from around –"

"We know exactly where you're from. Which is why you need to come with us," the man with the gruff voice answers. "Get on your knees."

Harley looks up at me, tears in her eyes, and I look up at Tobias. He stares straight at the other man through his visor and says, "No." His voice is dark and dangerous. In this moment, he's Four, not Tobias. He's the one who held a loaded gun against Peter's head, the one who threw knives at my face. After all Marcus put him through, Tobias would never kneel before another man, Dauntless or not. Zeke and Uriah fix the same steely gaze on the other group, and I adopt it too. We are Dauntless, and we aren't going to roll over and play dead.


	12. Chapter 12

I feel the all-too-familiar pressure of a gun barrel on my back, pressed right between my shoulder blades, forcing me to walk. I still clutch Tobias's and Harley's hands, but they each have guns urging them onward as well. We walk along the sea wall, our captors silent.

"Were are you taking us?" Christina demands. "We haven't done anything wrong. This is insane!"

"Christina," Tobias warns. Her Candor is showing.

The man with the gruff voice answers, "You are being taken to a holding facility."

"A _holding_ facility?" Christina just can't keep her mouth shut. "We aren't animals! Let us go!"

"Christina!" Tobias glares at her. "Stop."

I hear Harley sniffling next to me, but she keeps her eyes up and her shoulders straight. Dauntless through and through.

We walk until the sea wall ends. The ocean has made its way almost to the wall, and only a few hundred feet of marsh separates us from the ocean. The wind picks up, and carries icy spray over us. It feels like being stabbed with a needle every place a drop touches my body. My arms, my face, my neck… No wonder that man in the strange vehicle told us to leave.

Suddenly, our captors turn abruptly right, back toward the city. They herd us toward a squat, black building. There is no glass in this building's face. We are pushed through a large opening in the building's first floor, and immediately begin to descend a steep paved slope. The pavement is cracked and entire chunks are missing in places. We emerge into a dimly lit concrete room. The floors, walls, and ceiling are all the same unfinished shade of gray, and I suddenly feel claustrophobic. I can only imagine how Tobias must be feeling. His hand grips mine more tightly, and he begins to breathe more quickly, but his face shows no signs of distress.

"Walk!" the gruff man instructs, jabbing me in the back with the barrel of his gun. They herd us down another slope, and another, in a circular pattern. I feel like I am descending right into the center of the earth. When we are finally allowed to stop, we are in a small room lit only by a lantern in one corner. Our captors back out of the small room, leaving only the gruff man behind.

He removes his helmet, revealing shockingly green eyes and a scar bisecting his mouth. Harley cringes away from him.

"You will stay here. You will remain quiet. You will do exactly as you are told. You will not be getting your weapons back," he says. He backs out of the small room, and slams a metal door behind him. I hear a lock slide into place.

Harley gasps, and I put my arm around her shoulders. I wonder if this is what having a sister would have been like. I look up at Tobias, whose face looks angular and frightening in the dim lighting.

"What do we do?" I ask him. "What do they want?"

"Did you notice his collar?" he asks me.

"His collar? No, he was wearing that uniform."

"When he took his helmet off, I caught a glimpse of it." Tobias looks down at me, his face serious. "Erudite blue."

My stomach seems to sink to my feet. "They can't be here. They can't…"

"Maybe that color doesn't mean anything here," Christina says. "We've seen people dressed all sorts of weird ways since we got here."

"Maybe," Tobias says. He doesn't sound convinced. "The blue accents on their uniforms gave me a strange feeling, too. Besides, who else would want us imprisoned?"

"I don't know," I say. "I really don't know."

My back aches from sitting against the wall for what feels like hours. I'm freezing, but I gave my jacket to Harley. The gruff man came back only once, to toss a few bottles of water into the room. I twist my body and lean back so I am lying flat with my head in Tobias's lap. My stomach growls.

"We can't stay like this much longer, Four," Zeke says from across the small room. "What are we doing sitting here like this?"

"We tried to get out, remember? Check out Uriah's hand if you don't." Tobias says, his voice pinched.

He's right; Uriah nurses a few cut knuckles from pounding on the door. We discovered fairly quickly that there was no handle on the inside.

Zeke lets out an annoyed huff.

"Nobody likes it anymore than you do," Christina says.

Zeke glares at Christina, but I interrupt before they can start arguing. "Can you both just stop? It's not helping anything."

"Sorry," Zeke says. "We're probably scaring Harley, anyway."

"I am _not_ scared," Harley states defiantly. I can't help but smile. "What do you think I am, a coward?"

Rolling his eyes, Zeke leans back against the wall.

I feel Tobias's fingers trailing through my hair. They catch on a tangle, but instead of gently combing through it, they snag and pull. "Ow."

"Sorry," he says. His voice sounds caught in his throat. Then I realize why. We're trapped. We're trapped in a small, dark space. We might as well be back in his fear landscape. Only this time it's worse because it's real. I remember how I felt when I woke up in the tank in Erudite headquarters and realized I wasn't in a simulation. The panic that welled up inside me…

"Oh, God. Tobias," I sit up and look him straight in the eyes. He shakes his head imperceptibly. He doesn't want the rest of the room to realize he's terrified. I lay back down, take his hand and place it over my heart. "Just like last time," I wisper, hoping he remembers. I inhale deeply, and feel him do the same. I exhale, and he exhales. He does remember.

I am focusing on keeping my breathing steady when he says, "Your heart's not racing as quickly as it was last time, Tris." I can hear a tiny smile in his pinched voice.

I blush, remembering how I felt in that invisible box, pressed firmly up against the boy who was nothing but my instructor at the time. "Well, things are a little different now," I say. I feel him place his other hand on my stomach, and my heart jumps a bit. He stifles a chuckle. He noticed. I continue my attempts to keep my breathing steady for his benefit.

"Are you guys talking about being imprisoned in Erudite?" Christina asks.

"Are you sure you didn't want to stay in Candor?" I retort.

She makes a face at me. Then I see her glance across the room at Uriah, who ignores his bleeding hand. "Uri, you want me to clean that for you?"

"What?" he looks confused. "Oh, yeah sure."

Christina grabs one of the bottles of water, and scoots over to Uriah. She slips her jacket off her shoulders and removes her t-shirt, revealing a camisole. Clearly freezing, she shrugs back into her jacket, then tears a length of fabric from the hem of her t-shirt. She wets the fabric with a bit of the water. Then she takes Uriah's hand in hers and gently cleans the blood from his fingers. At first he doesn't seem to care, but as I watch, I see his eyes shift over to her. He watches her short, dark curls bounce as she cares for his wound. When she finishes, she takes another length of cloth from her shirt and wraps the dry fabric around his hand.

"Thanks, Chris," Uriah says, smiling. _Speaking_ and_ smiling!_ "You're a great friend, you know that? I wish we had hung out more before… you know."

Christina's face falls for a second, undoubtedly because he used the word "friend," but her smile reappears almost instantly. "No problem. And it's not like initiation really promotes friendship between Dauntless-borns and transfers."

She shuffles back over toward Tobias and me.

The door bangs open. The gruff man stands in the hallway.

"Up," he says. "She wants to see you."

Tobias leaps up, and I narrowly avoid slamming my head into the concrete floor. "Who wants to see us?" he demands as the rest of us slowly get to our feet. Harley slips her tiny cold hand in mine.

"Caroline," the man says. "She is the leader of our group."

"And what group might that be?"

"The one you only know about if she decides to tell you. Let's go." He marches into the room, and herds us out like cattle, poking the barrel of his gun into our backs at random.

We don't go back the way we came. Instead, we are taken to an antique elevator. The paint peeling off the rusted doors reveals that we are on a floor labeled P4.

"Is this some sort of parking garage?" Harley pipes up. "We talked about cars in my Faction History class last week, and I heard there used to be so many of them that people parked them underground. And I also heard once that if a floor has a 'P' before the number, it means you're underground." We all stare at her, open-mouthed. I thought she was Dauntless at the core, but then again, there might be a little bit of Erudite in this girl yet.

I am shocked even further when the gruff man actually answers her. "This used to be a parking garage, yes," he says. "But Caroline owns this building now. Besides," he looks at Harley in a way that makes me pull her closer to me, "there aren't enough cars out there to park underground anymore, missy."

I step in front of Harley, shielding her from the man's gaze as he punches the elevator button. He stares at her in the way the factionless man stared at me as he held my wrist the day before my aptitude test. I can still smell his stale breath, see his grayish teeth. The thought of this man coming any closer to Harley made me nauseous.

We press together inside the tiny elevator. I keep Tobias and myself between Harley and the gruff man. He pushes the button for the fourth floor, which appears to be the top floor in this small building. I expect an extremely quick elevator ride, until I remember that we're four floors underground.

The elevator bell dings seven times before it stops. We all flow out into a tiny foyer covered in gleaming wood paneling. Unlike the Amity compound, this wood shines and is accented with chrome doorknobs, light switches, and a small silver pad next to a door on the far end of the room. The gruff man pushes a few numbered keys on the pad, then a voice says, "Voice recognition. Please state your name."

"Ethan Hunt," he says.

"Ethan Hunt, you have been granted access. She will see you immediately."

Ethan leads us through the door, and sitting at a desk in the next room is a ghost. Something impossible. _Someone_ impossible.

* * *

**A/N - So, who do you think it is? Who is Caroline? Why is she keeping the Dauntless prisoner? You'll have to wait until next time to find out for sure. The next chapter should begin to clear up a few things. But you know what always happens when questions are answered... More seem to show up. ;) **


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N - Eek! I was super excited to write this chapter. I hope you all love it. P.S. There will be one more new character introduced in the next chapter, who I think many of you will like. Stay tuned! :)**

* * *

"Ah, Beatrice. I thought I would be meeting you soon," Caroline says with a smile that is both too familiar and very foreign. I cringe.

"How do you know my name?" I ask, but somewhere deep down, I already know the answer. She looks just like me. Her hair is blonde, just like mine, only hers is streaked with light gray. Her skin is pale, and her face is long and narrow. The only difference between us, besides the fact that she obviously has about forty years on me, is her eyes. They are blue, but not grayish like mine. They are both blue _and_ clear, like ice on a sunny day. The kind of blue you see if you look closely at snow, where you wouldn't usually expect to see anything but white. They pierce me like knives as they stare back at me.

"I have been watching you," she says. "All of you." She gestures to Tobias and the others. "I am the head of the Five Factions Project, a position which I inherited from my mother. My name is Caroline Ritter." She stares at me, waiting for me to comprehend, but I don't. I still have no idea who this woman is, or why she looks so much like me.

Tobias inhales deeply. "Oh," he breathes.

"Still nothing, Beatrice?" Caroline continues. "Fine, I'll give you another hint. You've seen a recording of my mother. _Amanda_ Ritter. Better known to you as Edith Prior."

Suddenly, things begin to click together in my mind. But still, one question remains unanswered. Why is this woman a strange ghost of my mother? "Why do you look like her?" I squeak out. My face turns beet red at the lack of bravery in my voice.

"I do not think you mean my mother, as I am aware that I look nothing like her. I am your mother's sister, Beatrice. I was born before my mother decided to involve herself in the Five Factions Project, but your mother was born afterward."

My voice stronger, I say, "But I don't understand. The name Prior… It should be my father's family name."

Tobias places his hand on my shoulder. "You know just as well as anyone that in Abnegation, a man can take a woman's last name just as easily as she can take his."

"I imagine your mother would know more about that than I do, but here we stand now. What has become of my dear little sister?" Caroline asks. Her presence leaves a metallic, ugly taste in my mouth. I know for a fact she never met my mother. How could she have? Her falseness leaves me feeling on edge, like I felt around Jeanine, when I still felt anything about her at all.

"My mother is dead." I say the words without thinking. I hear them come out of my mouth, but don't remember calling them forth. I've never said these words out loud before, and suddenly my chest feels like it's been ripped open. I wrap my arms tightly around myself, forcing the screaming sobs back down before they can break out of my throat. Christina places her hand on my shoulder.

"I am sorry to hear that. I would have liked to meet her." I think for a moment that Caroline might not be as cold as I had thought. "Ah, well. These things do happen." Maybe not. "Aren't you going to ask me _why_ I've been watching you?" She examines her fingernails, painted sky blue to match her dress. She almost looks bored with us.

I can't speak. I am too focused on keeping the sobs inside me. Tobias rescues me again. "Yes, why _have_ you been watching us?"

"Ah, this must be Tobias Eaton, am I right? Also known as 'Four'? You're more handsome than your profile lets on." I get the sudden and distinct urge to punch my aunt across the mouth, but I resist. Tobias doesn't respond to her compliment. He only continues his steely stare. I realize that Zeke, Uriah, Christina, and Harley are all staring at me, but I can't tear my eyes away from Caroline.

Sighing, she continues. "It is my job to make sure the Project continues to remain self-sufficient. That's why we had the exit removed from the highway and the fences installed. We couldn't have you all leaving before your time."

"You mean before the Divergents were more common?" Tobias asks.

"Yes. And who would have known that my very own niece would be the one leading the charge. I've been watching you for years, Beatrice. You and all the other Divergents have been my pet projects. I've got a whole room full of your files." She glances behind me."I see you and Tobias aren't the only ones visiting me today," she says as she stands and strides toward us. I freeze, then grab Harley's shoulder, pushing her back. Away from Caroline.

"Uriah Cohen, I presume." Caroline presses her face so close to Uriah's that, if he were anything but Dauntless, he would have stepped back. Instead, he presses one index finger into the soft spot under her shoulder until she steps back.

"Hm," she says, rubbing the spot where Uriah's finger was. "Touchy. And this must be the other Mr. Cohen. Zeke, correct? Not Divergent, but close. And what have we _here_?" Caroline walks toward me and stops at an awkward angle, just a little too far behind me. I expect her to speak to Christina, but she isn't Divergent. Is her sister? I have no idea. "Is this Harley Buchannan?" Caroline reaches around me, pulling Harley by the forearm. Harley lets out a small squeal, which for any non-Dauntless child would have been a shriek.

I slap Caroline's hand away from the girl, and pull her back to me. I fold her in my arms, and feel her small body shaking. "Don't touch her," I snap. The shock of realizing Harley is Divergent can wait. Right now, there are more important things to discuss. "What do you want with us? Why are we being kept here?" I demand. All my fear left me the moment Caroline put her hand on the child.

"Well, it seems we have a bit of a problem," Caroline says casually as she walks back toward her desk. She sits on the edge of it, and her skirt rides up her thighs just as Jeanine's did. The sight and the memory make me nauseous. "It seems the Five Factions Project was a bit of a failure."

"How can that be possible?" Tobias asks. I hear his dark, dangerous voice, and know he's trying just as hard as I am to keep his rage in check. I've never seen him lose control, even when he beat up Marcus in Candor Headquarters. He is always calculated. Controlled.

"Well, the Divergent were not expected to become so prevalent so quickly," Caroline explains. "Since it only took three generations before the gates were opened, my team and I have deemed the experiment a failure. Something must have gone wrong. All of the people involved in this experiment are being collected and held captive as we speak."

At this, Zeke gasps. "Shauna," he whispers. "I promised I'd come back for her! I promised!" His voice rises with every word.

"Oh, you won't be going anywhere anytime soon, Mr. Cohen," Caroline says, that small, Jeanine-esque smile spreading across her face.

"We'll just see about that," he says, lunging at her. Uriah moves at the same time as his older brother, like they are of one mind. They pin Caroline to the floor as she screams for guards. I feel something cold press into the palm of my hand. The hilt of a dagger.

"They never told me to drop my weapons," Harley whispers, looking up at me with her gold-flecked eyes. I smile, and press her small frame into Christina's arms. Tobias and I, armed with only fists and a single dagger, prepare to take on the three guards that enter the room. We stand back to back. I face a large man who looks to be half asleep, and a small woman with very dark skin and hair braided close to her scalp. She lunges at me, but an uppercut to the jaw stops her dead in her tracks. Her legs crumple beneath her as the light leaves her deep brown eyes. Tobias and I spin as the large man lumbers toward us, and I find myself face-to-face with Ethan Hunt.

He moves more quickly than I expect, and lands a hard punch to my right side. My ribs ache, and I gasp to force air back into my lungs. I lift my right foot off the ground and aim a kick at his throat, but he steps back quickly, and I lose my balance momentarily. It has been ages since initiation. Ethan punches me hard in the jaw, and I remember trying to stay on my feet the day Peter beat me into unconsciousness. My vision goes fuzzy around the edges, but I feel another person beside me. Not Tobias, whose hands are full with the gargantuan guard, but Christina. She nods at me, and we both lunge toward Ethan at the same moment.

Christina, with her long legs, lands a kick square to his jaw, while at the same time I watch the long knife disappear into his thigh. Ethan falls to the ground, clamping his hand over his wound, and I can tell by the way his eyes flick around the room that he's losing consciousness. Most likely from Christina's fabulously strong kicks. I'm glad I never had to fight her.

I hear a heavy thud behind us, and know Tobias has taken down his guard. He takes the dripping dagger from my hand, walks over to Ethan, and slams the pommel of the knife into the back of his skull. Ethan immediately slumps forward, facedown.

"You two make quite a team," Tobias says to Christina and I. "Where'd you get this?" He wipes the dagger on the back of Ethan's shirt, then flips it in the air.

I glance at Harley, and smile. "Nobody told _her_ to drop her weapons." Tobias hands her the knife, which she dutifully slides back into her tall boot. She beams with pride.

I notice suddenly that Caroline is no longer screaming. I look to where Zeke and Uriah had her pinned to the ground. They now stand around her motionless body. I don't like her, I don't even _know_ her, but for a moment, she feels like my family. _I hope she's not dead._

I walk over to them. "She's unconscious," Uriah says before I can ask. "She'll be fine. But let's get out of here before she comes to."

"Agreed."

I grab Harley's hand and Tobias grabs mine, and we run for the door.

In the elevator, I push the button labeled MAIN. I can't help but wonder exactly what we'll encounter once the bell dings the final time, but I don't have much time to think about it. I hear the bell, and the doors begin to slide open.


End file.
